Twist of Fate
by TheLittleBerlinBear
Summary: When twenty three year old F-22 Raptor Epsilon Majoris is shot down and wounded in battle, the damage forces her to quit her once hopeful air force career and look for another job, but she's not ready to stop fighting. In her new job, she won't be fighting battle against vehicles, she will be fighting something she never thought about fighting before. Fires
1. Chapter 1

Twenty three year old Epsilon Canis Majoris let out a sigh of relief, as she took off from the runway of the base where she had recently stationed. It felt wonderful after a long night of sleeping in a cramped hanger to be able to once again feel the rush of cool wind under her wings, and the thrumming of power through her whole frame. Up here, in the vast blue sky, she was unstoppable, unmatched, and completely in her element. This is where she was meant to be.

She banked hard to the left, then pulled up so her nose was pointed almost vertically to the ground. She didn't have to worry about stalling, her model: The Lockheed Martin F-22 Raptor was equipped with powerful afterburners with the ability to tilt, even when she wasn't. This even allowed her to take of vertically if needed, though she personally preferred a nice long runway.

Once she was satisfied with her altitude she leveled her wings and stopped her climb, by now the base was nothing more than the faintest dot on the horizon line behind her that even her eagle sharp eyes could no longer see.

It was a beautiful day to fly, high up here. The heat down near the ground was oppressive, especially for anyone coming from a place as cold as Alaska. Up here the thinner air made everything feel nice and icy, a welcome relief for sensitive wings.

*Raptor, do you copy?* A voice in the headset of her helmet asked.

Epsilon immediately responded. *I copy.* She said, dropping a few hundred feet lower, and in to a few patches of clouds.

*We need you to cover to a Medevac team under heavy fire. You are our closest asset, their location will be relayed to your positioning systems.* The speaker explained, and soon after there was a beep and on the small map at the bottom right corner of her visor a red point appeared, labeled with coordinates.

*Roger, ETA approximately ten mikes, Epsilon out." She said, banking right this time and dropping her altitude to just above the bottom layer of clouds, at once all her senses came to life. She was on high alert, every square inch of her airframe buzzed with energy. Even from high above any bit of movement on the ground cough her attention, like a true predictor.

It didn't take long for her to see the unfolding firefight. She flew down to a lower altitude sending footage from the camera in her helmet back to base, while assessing the situation. Two Blackhawk helicopters circled the pinned down friendly forces, providing much needed cover for the soldiers on the ground. Still, the circumstances didn't look very good.

She swooped lower, and spotted the enemy combatants. Just as she started to ready her arsenal of missiles, a call came through her radio again, coming from the ground forces below her. *Raptor, do you copy? We need air support! We're pinned down!*

*I copy, I have the enemy located. Is everyone clear, over?* She asked, as she found her weapon of choice for the task, but before firing she wanted to make sure that all the friendlies were out of way.

*All clear. You may commence firing, out.* They replied, and ended the transmission. The helicopters flew a little farther back as she blanked right sharply and leveled herself. Her weapons bays opened, and she released the first of her missiles, perfectly aimed at enemy forces. The swooped from the sky and exploded once they reached the ground.

Satisfied she had hit her mark she banked right again flying over them one more, this time dropping two small bombs from her weapons bays. They fell with deadly accuracy, and left large smoldering holes in the ground below.

This time she didn't immediately fly over the enemy's position again, instead she closed her weapons bays and soared over around the small combat zone, and focused her attention and surveillance equipment on the recovering enemy. Many were down. _Good. _She'd done what they had needed her to do.

The ground forces began opening fire, before they were able to recover, turning the tides and pinning them down. One of the two Blackhawks landed while the other began firing upon the enemy, and the medevac team quickly began to evacuate the wounded.

That's when the trouble started.

As she turned to do another fly over, she passed by a small band of mountains. As soon as she had turned with her tail towards the mountain an alarm blared in her helmet, and her systems went in to overdrive. Something had locked on to her.

She turned as sharply as she could, pulling almost strait up, even steeper than earlier. Whatever it was, it was still on her tail. She powered down her afterburners and dropped from the sky, a dangers and very difficult maneuver to pull out of. She could do it though.

The alarms started baring again, another projectile had been fired from one of the enemies on the ground. _Oh no you don't!_ She growled to herself, and pulled up and out of her freefall. She wasn't sure what was being fired at her, but it was best to try for everything, so she fired off a set of flares.

But it was too late, something had already caught up with her.

The explosion rattled her frame and knocked her in to a crazy spiral. The projectile had taken out on of her after burns and one of her secondary diamond shaped wings. She didn't have time to dwell on that as she tried to pull up out of the deadly dive. She watched in horror as the ground came closer and closer, and she strained to gain control of her dive, pulling up just barely at the last minute, as she forced herself to extend her landing gear, hoping she could at least brake her fall.

Then came the impact, but after that everything went black.


	2. Chapter 2

_Thank you to everyone who has reviewed this story so far! It means a lot!_

* * *

Epsilon let out a pained moan, as she woke up laying in mound of rocks and sand. For a while she couldn't feel much more than a throbbing ache in her right side, but it didn't take long for her pain to creep up on her, and leave her whimpering in the sand. She opened her eyes to look for danger, or someone coming to help her, but the glare of the sun quickly forced her to close them again.

She eventually opened her eyes once more, fighting back a cry of pain as she tried to get a look at the damage. She could feel she was missing her wings, and she wasn't quite sure what the condition of her secondary wings and stabilizers were in, but from the sound a sputtering engine she could tell at least one of her afterburners was still working enough to continue burning. Her landing gear was crumpled beneath her, and she could feel a deep gash in her side just under her left wing.

She groaned and closed her eyes again, the heat was horrible and the pain was unimaginable. All she could think about was making it stop.

Again she lost consciousness, falling in to a void of black nothingness.

When she awoke the second time she could here static in one side of her headset, but she was too weak to even try and contact her base. She didn't have the strength to even think clearly, so trying to signal for help was out of the question.

As she lay in the dust, barely wake she began to hear what sounded like helicopter blades…

She groaned in pain and opened her eyes as she tried her best to prop herself up a small rock. She ended up not eve being strong enough to move an inch. She looked around as far as she could, but between the sand in her eyes and the glare of the sun she couldn't see a thing.

She closed her eyes again and just lay limply in the sand, her head felt like it was being pounded on by jackhammer and her whole airframe was plagued with agonizing pain.

As she lay there, the sounds of helicopters got louder and she began to feel wind against her frame. It seemed like hour before she finally heard shouting, and felt the strong wind of a near by chopper.

She opened her eyes weakly, and saw a large sandy colored pickup truck rush towards her. He shouted something at her over the noise of rotors, but she couldn't understand a word he said.

He drove up next to her face. "Can you hear me?!" He shouted over the wind.

She let out a weak groan, trying to talk. The only thing that came out was a pathetic squeak. She closed her eyes again, and fought to turn off her working afterburner.

Everything after that was like a dream, reality slipping from her grasp leaving only fleeting traces of memory behind. But after everything that had happened, she took comfort in the fact that she was in good hands now.

"Epsilon, can you hear me?"

Epsilon groaned, opening her eyes and fighting the bright glare to lights. "Wha….?" She asked as he eyes adjusted. She was in an operating room, being swarmed from all sides by mechanics and air force personnel. Two bright white lights hung just over her head, and the sound of welders and other medical equipment hard at work, repairing her mangled frame.

To her relief she watched the familiar face of John Wherling -her mechanic- frowning up at her, forks crossed and eyebrows forming a V shape. "Good, you're awake. How do you feel?" He asked, using one of his forks to lifter up her head and inspect the damage to her underbelly.

She flinched as he prodded a few scraped and sore patches under her chin, than began cleaning them out, making twitch slightly when he rubbed the cleaner on the open wound.

She took a few moments to consider his question, looking at reflective surfaces around the room to get a good look at her condition, only to find out that they had draped a tarp over most of her, probably to keep her from seeing the damage. "I… I don't think there's part of me that doesn't hurt…" She finally said, her voice was quiet and quivering.

John snorted, not even looking up. "Not surprising, you took quite a fall there. You're lucky to be alive, even more so that you can talk to me this soon after."

Epsilon made a small noise of agreement and closed her eyes again, overwhelmed. "How bad is it?" She asked, although she dreaded the most likely answer.

"Well, if your luck continues to hold, you may be able to fly again, though we shouldn't get out hopes up yet." He said, getting down from his lift, and driving around to where her wings were supposed to be. "Now get some rest, before I have to knock you out." He said, picking up a large needle and tapping it on one of his forks. "We all know how well that always works out."

Epsilon didn't bother protesting, she was just glad the pain killers that she knew were running in to drips were working well enough to take the edge of most of the pain.

She closed her eyes and concentrated on falling back asleep, but the noise, commotion and the rest of the pain made it hard for her to get a clear enough head.

After a few minutes she felt John poke the needle in to her fuel pump. "It should start working in a few minutes, so just hang tight." He said

Epsilon made a whine in return, and sighed heavily. She was awake enough that she was now able to think clearly enough to relies she had been the first of her kind to be shot down in combat. Sure, others, -Like her Father- had crashed, but she'd been shot down by enemy fire. She groaned, and tried to shove that thought out of her mind. _Not here, not now._ She thought. _I can't dwell on that… not while I'm still in here…_

Slowly she felt the tranquilizer take effect and she drifted off in to a deep sleep, as the mechanics continued to work.


	3. Chapter 3

_Two weeks later…._

Connor Alpha didn't relaxed until all of his massive wheels were safely down on the tarmac, but still even then he didn't fully relax. He wasn't safe here, he didn't want to stay longer than needed; at least the darkness helped hide his immense airframe.

He had landed at the base at midnight, his gray camouflage paint hid him against attacks from the ground. He had flown in with every light off, but he was still a huge target, and he couldn't risk being seen by enemy ground forces. Still, the massive roars of his turbines was deafening, and carried across the whole basin. Everyone within miles of the runway could hear him.

Even here, in the middle of the sprawling base, he felt vulnerable.

The massive C-5 Galaxy quickly pulled in to his designated spot, safely between two large buildings. He opened his cargo hatch and his crew quickly pulled out several bulky pallets of supplies, and a brand new rotor assembly. They needed to hurry. He wanted to be up and out of the base before first light.

Once everything was out, it was time for the next payload. But this time, it was something much more important than freeze dried snack rations, laundry detergent and a half a ton of baking flower.

"Well, well, well if it isn't the _Aluminum Overcast_."

Connor looked down to see a green and gray forklift grinning up at him. "Good evening to you too John." He said, rolling his eyes. His voice was surprising light, and quiet for a plane of his size. "Now, are you guys read to load up? I need to leave before dawn."

"Yeah, we can get you out by sunrise." He said. "We just need to be careful… Don't want to cause more problems than there are already." He said.

Connor snorted. "But it wouldn't help if we were all shot out of the sky." He said, giving him a look.

"I know, I know…. Just be patient." John said, before disappearing in to the hanger to the Galaxy's left. A few minutes later, as ground crew were inspecting Connor for any damage, the hanger door slowly opened.

Connor had gotten some of the medical details of the plane they wanted him to carry back to Alaska, but he hadn't expected this. A young Raptor, maybe in her early twenties, he couldn't see anything past where her wings should have begun, because she was covered in a large white cloth. But it didn't take a surgeon to figure out how bad the damage was. Connor flinched. John had told him he had a plane who needed to be flow back to Anchorage, who had lost her wings in a crash… But he hadn't told him the extant of the damage.

The team of mechanic slowly pushed her up the back ramp, and in to the cargo hold. Connor let out an anxious sighed, and waited. His eyes watched the clock in the open medi hanger. "Please hurry…." He said, this time hoping not only for a quick take off, but for the young planes quick recovery. He knew if she had lost her wings and crashed, yet was stable enough to endure a long flight, it had to have been at least a week since the crash, in her case probably more. He wonder what the chanced of her ever being able to fly were, he guess that they couldn't be real great.

"Stay strong." He whispered.

* * *

Epsilon's eyes shot open as she was woken up by a deafening roar all around her, and for a moment she felt as if she was falling again. She panic, trying to fire up her after burners and pull out of the dive…

"Whoa! Whoa! Calm down! You're alright! You're going home!"

Epsilon seemed to calm a little when she noticed she wasn't falling. She looked around, two other mechanics sat with they're equipment nearby. She could tell she was inside a large planes, she should couldn't tell what type, but that didn't matter.

She noticed she was still hooked up to several monitors, and guess they were there as a safety precaution. They had told her they weren't too worried about her anymore, that all she really needed now was a few repair parts, her wings and a lot of time to heal.

"Don't worry, they're just there in case the air pressure, or things of that nature start causing you any problems." John said calmly, putting away a few of his tools.

Epsilon swallowed. "Why didn't you tell me?" She asked.

"Well, first and foremost, we just recently decided you were well enough to transport. We wanted to make sure that you weren't in any danger." He said. "Also, I contacted your mother, and she wanted it to be a surprise when you woke up in Anchorage, but that wasn't real high on my priorities." He got out a notepad out of a bag. "Plus, the faster we get you home, the faster you can get your wings back, and the faster you can fly again."

Epsilon bit back a quiet whine. She hadn't really thought about that, part of her didn't want to fly again. She kept thinking about the crash, and the pain and the feeling of pure helplessness. Part of her wanted to never go through that again…

She looked away from John and to a spot on the floor to her left. She felt miserable, not only because of the damage from the crash, but mentally as well. She was the first Raptor to be shot down in combat, that wasn't supposed to happen! They were supposed to be unsurpassed, unstoppable…..

The young Raptor blinked back tears as her emotions began building inside her like a pressure cooker. What would her parents say? She'd let her family down… _I let Dad down…_ She bit the inside of her cheek and focused on the floor. She'd let everyone down.

Noticing her saddened expression, John rolled up in front of her. "Epsilon?" He asked.

Epsilon flinched, she had hoped he hadn't noticed her sulking. "Yes?" She asked, forcing down her emotions back up in the "bottle".

"If your blaming yourself, don't." He said. "Your just like your mother, something goes wrong, you blame yourself." His face turned serious. "I know you're beating yourself up over this, and I know you're worried about what your mother is going to think, what your father would think." His face seemed to soften again, he put a fork on his nose. "They're both proud of you, they always will be."

"How do _you_ know?!" She demanded, she wasn't sure how to react other than that.

John chuckled lightly, giving her an optimistic look. "If I knew your father half as well as I pride myself in thinking, I know he'd be proud of you, Epsilon." He picked a few of his tools, and started organizing his bag, what he did when he wasn't sure what else to do. "And your IS proud of you, and I'm sure your little brother thinks you're the best big sister ever." He said.

Epsilon swallowed. _Orion…._

"From what your mother told me, he brags to all his friends that his sister is the best fighter on the planet." John said smiling up at her. "And he's been worried sick about you."

Epsilon glared at him. "That's not helping…" She snapped. She couldn't help but feel she had let her brother down too. He had always looked up to her, now she'd let him down. What was he supposed to tell his friends now? That his sister was he first Raptor to be shot down in combat?

John sighed, setting down a big silver wrench. "Alright, I'll stop talking." He said, he knew that it was usually best to let her calm down before discussing things like this. Still, it was worth a shot.

_A shot… why didn't I remember to do that before we took off?! _He mentally smacked himself multiple times over. He had planned on sedating her for most of the trip, because once they reached cruising altitude it was going to get pretty uncomfortable for a plane fresh out of the infirmary.

He sighed. _Great, now get to try and sedate a 20 ton aircraft in another moving aircraft while still climbing. How fun…._ The forklift thought sarcastically.

He took out the large needle and moved to where her wings should have been. "Okay, Epsilon. I'm gonna sedate your once more for the flight, because you're not going to be real comfortable during this flight, and I still have work left to do that will be messed up if so much as twitch." He said, laughing slightly.

Epsilon was pulled out of her thoughts one more, feeling a slight bit terrified, and forgetting the chaos of her emotions. "Wait, and you want to do that while still in flight? What if we hit an air current?!" She asked, giving him a panicked look.

He just laughed again. "I'm kidding, but it's going to hurt. So it's best if you're not awake for those adjustments."

Epsilon glared at him once more, but for a completely different reason. "I hate you."

"Yeah, I know that sweetie." He laughed. "Your dad said the same thing."

"I'm sure he meant it too." She snapped back at him. "And don't call me sweetie!"

He just chuckled. "Now, can I get this over with, or shall we spend this whole flight bickering about our feelings?"

Epsilon let out a mock irritated sigh, troubles forgotten. "Fine, just get it over with." She said.

John nodded, and injected the serum. After that it didn't take long before Epsilon fell back asleep once more.

* * *

O.O Why was this so hard to write?

A F-22 Raptor weighs around 21 tons, but because Epsilon doesn't have her wings or vertical stabilizers I would guess she weighs a little less, maybe 18 tons or so. Still, for a C-5 Galaxy that should be no problem. They can carry around 112 tons of cargo!

Sorry for any mistakes, I don't have a Beta's for this story... or for any of my stories for that matter. I _had_ some, but not anymore. So, I'm (Please, pardon the expression) Winging it.

Some, part of my reasoning for having John sedate Epsilon for the light is that being up high with the different air pressure and things is not really great when your hurt. I learned this the hard way, while flying to Germany to visit my grandparents a few years ago, and all I did was fall of a trampoline and hit my spine on a rock. _ I don't even want to know how bad it would feel after damage like that, even if your an airplane!

Now, I have to go before my cat steals the rest of my Banana.


End file.
